Ocean
by the vineyard tales
Summary: In this post-apocalyptic tale, Sarada struggles to live day to day with a handful of survivors, including the man who once loved her mother. [Sequel to Passing Rain.]
1. Sarada

**A/N** : I do not own _Naruto_. This is a sequel to _Passing Rain_. I might make it into a three-chapters story just like its earlier counterpart, although it might not work out that way in the end. Thank you for your support in reading my fanfics.

* * *

All that Uchiha Sarada wanted in life was a father.

More specifically, Uchiha Sarada wanted Uchiha Sasuke to be the darling daddy figure that she had always desired, the father that she most desperately craved attention from.

Instead, she found him as a mangled, brittle skeleton on an arid, deserted battlefield one sunny afternoon. She didn't know where she was, or what the place used to be. But she recognized the Uchiha crest on the dark cotton cloak and instantly knew that it was he, the one that she yearned for all those 15 years of her life.

"Typical," Sarada bitterly spat while looking down at the remains of her father. "He's already gone as soon as I found him."

One by one, the survivors who traveled with Sarada caught up to her. They came to her side, took a look at the bones of the legendary senior Uchiha, and passed their condolences to her. Their words typically ranged from, "I'm so sorry for your loss, Sarada," to "He was a great shinobi, and a wonderful family man," even though they had no idea just how much, or little, Sasuke meant to Sarada and Konoha.

She didn't cry. No, Sarada thought, Uchihas don't cry. We never show our weaknesses to anyone, ever. I am an Uchiha. I'm part of an ancient clan that was once compact with supreme warriors. The Uchihas are too powerful to produce tears for a mediocre event such as this…

Unaffected by the outwardly kind words from strangers around her, Sarada stayed seemingly dispassionate and desiccated. Only the wind crackled through, maliciously blasting every dust particles toward the mourning survivors.

That deadbeat's not worth crying for, Sarada thought. He's not. He isn't…

While Sarada mentally blocked out a symphony of sundry stares from the spectating strangers, a hand was laid upon her shoulders. Steadily, she turned around and instantly saw his eyes, so blue and bright as the summer sea.

The man didn't utter any run-of-the-mill lines of feigned sympathy. No, despite his reputation as the loud-mouthed, obstreperous ninja of Konoha, Uzumaki Naruto knew when to keep his mouth shut.

His eyes were so frighteningly vast, yet so tender and comforting.

One by one, subtle, perfidious tears rolled down her cheeks, to the derelict earth. Uchiha Sarada broke out in sobs, within Naruto's embrace, for the rest of the afternoon.

All that Uchiha Sarada wanted at the moment was his touch.


	2. Into the Ocean

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Naruto.

* * *

The snow quietly descended from the gray ceilings of the earth. Each flake elegantly laid itself on top of one another. At times, they danced carelessly with the wind, whirling in shameless flirtation. With a swoop, however, rushing feet destroyed the pristine layer of snow. Gelid white powder flickered through the misty air as Sarada ran with Naruto, his arm slung over her shoulders.

"Just hold on," Sarada whispered while gritting her teeth. "Please hold on."

Beads of sweat rolled down from her forehead, despite how the frost whipped across their faces.

Sarada could feel Naruto's body lose heat as she dashed across the snow. Within his half-closed eyes, the blue orbs were now almost as cold as ice. Blood was rushing out of his lips and wounds.

From the distance, there were ghastly howls and snarls that chilled her to the bones. She had no time to lose.

Luckily for her, there was a shelter near by on the edge of a cliff.

* * *

He woke to the crackles of wood in the hearth.

Habitually, Naruto bounced up like a spring, but soon groaned in pain. His hand automatically reached to where the aching throbs were. He wasn't wearing a shirt. Someone had neatly stitched and bandaged up his sides, though there were still minuscule blots of blood on the medical wraps.

"You're awake," the familiar voice spoke not far from his bed.

"Sarada!" Naruto said. He soon took note of the unknown territory. "Where are we? What happened to the rest?"

The girl threw logs into the fireplace. She made no utterance. She didn't even dare to look at him.

Most people would've shut up at this point, taken aback from the awkward silence. But not Naruto. He was relentless. "What happened to the rest?" he repeated.

"Gone," she said, still facing the fire.

Clutching his sides, Naruto pushed himself up and away from the bed. He soon regretted his haste actions, but even that didn't slow him down for further inquiry. "What about the men?"

"Gone," she tersely replied.

"And the women?"

"Gone."

"Even the kids?"

"…"

He felt his innards churn as he slowly hobbled toward the fireplace. "What do you mean they're gone, Sarada? They can't be gone. They can't be…! How could all of them die in one day—"

He was about to grab Sarada's shoulder, but she was too fast. She already faced him with tears running down nonstop.

"What else do you want me to say?" she said, unsuccessfully trying not to choke up. "I couldn't protect them, okay?! Is that what you want to hear?"

Sarada broke out in sobs as Naruto collapsed in front of her, reeling from the news. And then, just as he did three years ago, he gradually held her against his chest.

* * *

The hot desert gust roared, shaking every fiber of her being.

 _This looks familiar_ , Sarada thought as she looked beyond the flat plains. There was nothing but the indigo sky, matted and undisturbed, beyond the horizon.

Sarada always wondered why she was there, in the lifeless kingdom that was so foreign to her.

Nevertheless, she wandered, just as she had habitually done with the survivors in the past. As she traversed the region, it became strangely ethereal and comforting to her.

As she walked, Sarada thought that at least a century passed, until she saw someone trudge toward her in the distance.

She couldn't see the figure clearly from the heat wave and the desert gust. Even using sharingan was pointless. She blinked to keep the sand away from her eyes, and kept her steady pace.

Suddenly, the figure began to move as if it was cut from one scene to the next like spliced surveillance clips. Sensing danger, Sarada tried to leap back, but the figure soon emerged just a few steps away from her. It was coming closer. It was now close to her.

She couldn't dare speak. The intense violet light from the horizon prohibited from staring directly at the creature.

It was…

It…

Her eyes lit up as she heard the birds chirp.

They were both in the same bed. Sarada was within his arms.

She sighed. While tending to Naruto's wounds and protecting the shelter till dawn, Sarada felt extreme drowsiness. She rubbed her eyes and shook her leg to stay awake, but even her body was already giving up on her.

With watchful eyes, Naruto examined Sarada's will to stay awake. She was already fatigued. He knew that she would have to be let off from her night watch soon.

"Take a break, Sarada," he advised her, breaking the thick layer of silence that they both built up for hours.

"And who will watch over you?" Sarada replied while washing cloths in the basin. "Who will watch over this place?"

Not once did she ever take her eyes off from the basin.

 _Stubborn_ , Naruto thought. _Just like her mother…_

He smiled. No one ever ignored Naruto when he smiled, especially not Sarada.

"What's so funny?" Sarada said sharply.

He reached his hand out to the dark strands of her hair, and tucked them behind her ears.

"You're just like her," he said absent-mindedly, almost as if in a trance.

Red tints rose upon Sarada's cheeks. "You're a delusional old man," Sarada whispered as she brushed Naruto's hand away as if it was a fly.

He chuckled. "The only delusional one is you, Sarada. You need to sleep, or else you will–"

Before he could even finish, Sarada collapsed next to him, on the side of his bed.

Naruto thought of leaving her like that, but he knew that Sarada deserved more than an uncomfortable rest. Carefully, smiling through the pain as he shuffled his body, Naruto dragged her into his bed. He tucked her in his arms, and patted her back gently like a baby until his eyes closed as well.

It was early morning, and the sun was barely up. Sarada tilted her head up slightly, and peered at the man who was sleeping next to her. Instinctively, anxiously, she used sharingan to check his chakra flow. When she saw that his chakra and breathing were at steady pace, she sighed in relief.

She continued to study his features. His hair was gold, like the wheat field that she once saw in the Land of Rice Fields. Unlike the buzz cut that Sarada was well acquainted with during his reign, Naruto's hair was now an unkempt haystack. Seeing him like this, especially up close, made Sarada feel at ease, as if she knew Naruto for eons.

She reached up and attentively pressed her fingertips on his tanned cheeks, which were slightly sallow due to his illness. Still, he was warm as the balmy days of late summer.

Carefully, ever so softly, Sarada ran her fingers down from his cheeks, to his nose, and finally to his lips. Breathing heavily, she blushed when she realized that she had been stroking his lips in a dream-like state.

 _But just once_ , she wondered. _What would it be like if I…_

She was at close proximity to his face. With half-lidded eyes, Sarada brushed his lips once more with her fingertips, and gingerly swooped in inch by inch.

Just before she could even press her lips to his, she reluctantly stopped.

"I shouldn't," she murmured to herself. "I really shouldn't."

She quietly slipped out of his arms, and out of the bed. With urgency, she decided that there was low supply of water in the shelter. She snatched the bucket near the bedpost, zipped up her boots, and stumbled out the door.

Meanwhile, Naruto pried open his eyes, cognizant of the events that unfolded few minutes ago.

* * *

Sarada dashed through the forest like a rabbit chased by its hunter. She wanted to forget so badly about what happened that morning.

 _Why did I even try?_ Her mind rapidly wandered through the realm of regrets.

She knew long before that she was in love with Naruto, ever since she first had her eyes on him. She wanted to be like him, and perhaps be with him in the distant future, side by side. But that future was long gone, forever burnt and grounded up into ashes like her friends and foes underneath the solemn earth. For the first time, after the disappearance of her mother, after the absolute destruction of the world that she loved so much, Sarada realized how much of a disgrace Naruto was as the hokage, as a leader of Konoha.

And she hated him for failing to protect the ones he loved. He couldn't even save his wife and children. Sarada didn't know the reason behind it, but she thought that even if there was logic behind his failure, it wasn't valid and just. In her eyes, Uzumaki Naruto was a coward.

Yet, she could never understand why she harbored such strong feelings for this utter failure of a man. Sarada knew that Naruto had nothing to offer her — no prestige, no family, no power, and certainly no love. To her, Naruto was a complete stranger, even though he was once part of the infamous Team 7 with her parents. And she was certain that Naruto felt the same way about her as well.

 _Water_ , she meditatively chanted in her mind, attempting to wash the lingering thoughts away. _I've got to find water!_

Then, as if her prayers had been answered, she heard water flowing through the snow-covered rocks in the immediate vicinity.

* * *

It could've been hours, or mere seconds. The time, the sun and the shadows, were not Sarada's main priorities at the moment. Her bucket was already filled with fresh clean water from the stream, but her body was one with nature, still as a rock on top of a boulder.

It was clear as day that she didn't want to go back to the shelter. She enjoyed the cool atmosphere that calmed the inner fire that she kindled within her heart for years in barred rooms. She stretched and kicked her legs up in the air, taking pleasure in the fact that she wasn't trapped in a confined space with strung out survivors. She was free, and she wanted to savor this moment alone for once.

 _Finally, no random lockdowns, no roughhousing over the last morsel of food, no draws from the hat…_

Just then, a light rustle from the bushes in front broke Sarada out from her daydreams. Her fingers automatically snatched a kunai from her thigh rig and threw it up front.

There was a squeal, followed by a light thud of her kunai.

Armed with another kunai in her hand, Sarada tiptoed to the bushes. She was to strike the intruder on a count of three.

 _One…_

Her palms grew sweaty as her heart raced.

 _Two…_

The snow crunched underneath her feet as her movement became brisk.

 _Three!_

Sarada bolted to the snow-covered branches and raised her knife up in the air, only to halt when she realized that it was only a snow-white rabbit lying on the ground, passed out from the sheer shock of her flying kunai.

Sighing in relief, Sarada pulled out her kunai from the tree trunk, and slid it back into her thigh rig. Then, using the kunai that was still in hand, she instantly slit the rabbit's throat.

 _No use in letting good food and pelt go to waste_ , she thought, drawing the blood out and burying it along with the rabbit's head in the near frozen soils.

Once upon a time, Sarada would've let the rabbit go. That is, she would've if she had still lived in delusions of having a father who was far more protective and powerful than any daimyos or 20,000 samurais on the planet. Now, Sarada was almost 18 years old, and fully capable of taking care of herself. She wasn't reliant on anyone, not that there were any persons out there other than Naruto to depend on. She knew how to survive.

After she finished cutting the rabbit with her swift, adept fingers, Sarada washed her knife and hands in the stream. Then, paying no heed to another rustle in the bushes, she picked up her belongings to head back to the shelter.

It was probably just another white rabbit.

* * *

It was almost noon, and there was no sign of Sarada.

Naruto was worried. Crawling out from the bed, he gathered his garments, slipped on his boots, and trudged out into the winter sunlight. The icy air filled his ailing lungs as he plunged his feet into the deep snow.

Sensing her chakra, he knew that she couldn't have gone far. Her footprints, scattered from sporadic leaps, were still freshly imprinted in the snow. Naruto followed them toward the forest.

"What's taking you so long?" he muttered, gritting in pain while picking up his pace.

As Naruto stepped into the forest, he noticed peculiar footprints that interfered with Sarada's. They dragged unnaturally in the snow, with equivocal dents dotted with blood.

That's when Naruto realized that he was too late.

"Sarada!" Naruto cried.

With an abrupt boom, he was knocked down to the ground by the force of pyrotechnic and a body that flung into his chest.

Groaning, Naruto adjusted his head up and saw an unconscious, limp Sarada sprawled across his body.

As if lightning had struck him, Naruto jolted out from the snow and held her in his arms.

"Sarada!" he said, tapping her face lightly. "Sarada! Please, please, please… Don't die! Sarada!"

She didn't budge. Her eyes remained closed.

Tears began to pool within his eyes.

 _No_ , he thought. _Not her…_

As the bright blaze magnificently burned the forest behind them, a small moan slipped out from her lips.

"Sarada?" he said. Leaning one ear to her nose, Naruto sighed in relief as he heard her breathing at a regular pace. She was safe. She would live another day.

But there was no trace of reassurance within her eyes. "We have to go," she said. Her voice was barely audible.

"What are you saying—"

"They're coming," she rasped, pointing her finger weakly toward the forest.

Howls and snarls heavily reverberated through the black smoke. The flames flickered, desperately trying to veil their twisted countenances from the world. Still, from one glance, Naruto knew who they were, and how far more grotesque and malicious they were than they looked.

There were hundreds, no, thousands of those unearthly fiends yearning for his throat to be clenched within their sinewy claws.

"The Beings," he whispered. He had no time to lose. Before one of the creatures lunged forward from the blaze, Naruto lifted Sarada in his arms and ran posthaste to the shelter.

With their bodies in flames, the Beings chased after Naruto.

Naruto knew that he could never make it to the front door with his speed. His body was already deteriorating from his weakened condition. He cursed himself inwardly as he staggered through the snow to save Sarada.

There was no chance in hell that he would let Sarada die.

To ensure minimum amount of damage from the creatures, Naruto applied last bits of his chakra on the soles of his feet. Then, with a powerful leap, he threw himself and Sarada into the window.

The glass shattered everywhere as the two bodies violently rolled on the wooden floor.

They were inside the shelter, but even in her semi-conscious state, Sarada knew that they were nowhere near safety. The Beings would soon break in from the windows and the front door with their supernatural strength, and gnash their teeth into her flesh.

She tilted her head towards Naruto, whose body was sprawled across the floor and eyes were shut. He was knocked out cold. Blood seeped out from his mouth again.

Her fingers feebly inched toward her thigh rig, and produced a kunai with two black tags attached on its end. It was her special weapon, and she used it sparingly for rare occasion.

She only had one left.

Sarada crawled towards Naruto and wrapped him within her poncho. The Beings were already hurling their spindly limbs into the windows, pressing their distorted, sunken features together on the shelter walls.

 _It's now or never_ , Sarada thought as she threw her last special kunai to the Beings. In less than a second, the kunai exploded into a brilliant blaze along with the creatures.

Sarada and Naruto were catapulted off from the shelter, and away from the cliff. Their bodies soared through the sky like rag dolls before plunging into the ocean.


	3. Naruto

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Naruto_.

* * *

Two bodies were drowning in the ocean.

As he sank to the starless ends of the water, his past choices flashed before his eyes.

The 12-year-old Uzumaki Naruto was like a chickling that twittered nonstop about becoming the Hokage and gaining acknowledgement from his village. He was a hapless little boy, starved for sentience and yearning for something, _anything_ that was benignly tangible at his fingertips.

Yet, Naruto could never see beyond the periphery of his linear scope. Becoming the Hokage would dissolve the ordeals that he was asphyxiating from in life, or so he believed.

He was submerged under water, but the 38-year-old Uzumaki Naruto was fully awake. He was able to meditate on what he wanted in life all along: Love, and a family of his own, though he never realized all this even when he was married with children.

Years went by, and he finally admitted to himself that he wasn't destined to have both when he chose Hinata. It was either family or love. He had to pick one or the other.

There were no exceptions.

Naruto chose Hinata because he thought that they both shared a common goal on building a loving, trusting relationship and family. How wrong he was on that one.

He was dead wrong, and he knew how wrong he was before he married Hinata. His wife was sweet, but was saccharine to the point where he was tired being upheld on her pedestal. She was delicate, but meek to the point where she feared to displease him, let alone be at odds with the great Uzumaki Naruto. She was kind, but she was no Haruno Sakura.

When he was with Sakura, Naruto was able to be himself. He was able to taste her sauciness, revel in her impudence, and absorb her boldness from the well of courage that even he didn't know she had within the depths of her spirit. Just listening to her laugher gave Naruto strength of a million to protect her gentle heart.

But every time Naruto got one step closer to her, he had to retract a step back. Tainting Sakura's pure heart was a gamble that he didn't want to risk. He loved her for loving Sasuke, for never once changing her mind despite years and years of indifference and flak she received from her crush. He wanted to keep her purity intact, guard it at all cost, even if it meant repressing his desires for her.

Even just once, he wished to have her silky rose locks laced between his fingers. But he had to grit his teeth and conceal the hankering that he had for her behind his blue-sky eyes. It was all for her sake, he believed.

He was mad about her. Naruto was an utterly hopeless and a positively helpless fool for her. In spite of all the fickle seasons that faded with the wind, he was never able to change that one particular fact about himself because he was Uzumaki Naruto, and she was Haruno Sakura.

* * *

Naruto opened his eyes as soon as he heard pure echo of water drops trickle to the gravels. Sarada was sitting next to him.

"Where are we?" he rasped. Twisting the cap off a battered canteen, the girl poured water into his mouth.

"In a cave," she said, listening to his smooth gulps that seemed to drift away into the dark oblivion. "We were washed up on the shore."

Naruto pulled his lips away from the canteen. "How many days have gone by?" he said as he tried to sit up.

"I honestly don't know. In fact, I haven't the slightest idea of where we're at," responded the girl.

Despite Sarada's adroitly patched bandages, ointments and stitches, he felt the unbearable throbbing pain in his ribs, more so than the last time in the shelter.

"Your entire right shoulder and left leg are contused. Also, I had to mend your stitches again," Sarada said as she twisted the cap back on the canteen.

Naruto breathed in and exhaled slowly to ward off the discomfort. Still, he began to wheeze, and he cursed the fact that his body was always more honest than his actions or speech.

Sarada tried to ease him down on his back. "You need rest," she said.

"I'm fine," replied Naruto, and pushed his torso against her stubborn palms.

Even his small efforts were insufficient as he began to cough. The dry, throaty hacks reverberated through the concaved walls.

"You need to rest–," Sarada insisted, but stopped as she saw blood splatter out from his mouth. Naruto tried to detain his coughs with the palm of his hand, though it was a futile attempt.

"Hold on!" Sarada cried as she produced green glows from her hands and placed them over Naruto's chest.

In mere seconds, as gallons of fresh blood poured out from his mouth, Naruto fell back into the darkness again.

* * *

There was nothing waiting for the Konoha survivors in the Land of Iron. The country was desolate, as if time froze the area still with ice and snow.

The houses emitted no light. Not even stray dogs or cats roamed the streets.

Many doors were unlocked. Quickly, the starved survivors scrambled around, scavenging for food and water. Sure enough, there were some leftover canned food and stocks of bottled water inside most homes.

"We should live here," someone spoke as they returned back to the arranged meeting spot. Most of the survivors quickly agreed, though the remaining naysayers suggested that it would be better if they gather what they need and move to another territory with warmer climate.

Despite the protests, the majority won effortlessly through democratic votes. Soon, the weary travelers made themselves at home in the once neutral, but now forsaken and abandoned nation.

They never heard the snarls that slinked through the edges of the forest…

There was no need to mourn for those who were long gone. It was part of life, and nothing more.

At least, that was often the mantra of the survivors.

One by one, the survivors disappeared into the snow. Even the last stubborn villager was dragged into the forest, flesh torn and tattered within the jaws of the Beings, never to be seen again.

The survivors always came back for each other in different forms and shapes. They became the Beings themselves, the Beings being once them.

Naruto caught a glimpse of a Being's face once, bearing its rotting flesh and bones shamelessly.

They wanted to take him too.

And as they sank their teeth into his flesh, Naruto screamed and screamed, knowing that what he had done was irreversible all along.

He wanted to be forgiven.

He wanted to be with her again.

* * *

"Wake up!" her voice had shaken him away from his nightmares once more.

She was akin to the stunning beauty that was her mother. Naruto loved her; he did with all his heart, but not with the same intentions as he did with her mother.

"How long was I out?" Naruto rasped. Blood gurgled out from his mouth again.

"Three days, I'm assuming," Sarada said. She quickly hauled the weak man up, letting the blood trickle to the ground.

He coughed and coughed, and all she could do was watch him, knowing fully aware that no jutsu was powerful enough to cure this dying being. Her glowing green palms were useless against the nuclear explosions, useless against mounds of rotting flesh on innocent bystanders, useless against the Beings, and now, death itself.

She cried. That was all Sarada could offer to this man.

Naruto laughed.

Blood continued to pour out from his mouth, and he steadily fell down, unable to support his exhausted frame.

She shot back at him with eyes that were like welts left by angry hornets. "What's so funny?! You're about to die! Do you find this situation entertaining, you fool?!"

His laughter soon deceased, and only a small smile remained on his wan lips.

"It's done," he mused weakly. "I don't have to suffer any more."

Shakingly, Sarada reached her hands out toward him.

"I'm happy," he continued, closing his eyes. "I did everything I could. Maybe I could finally see them again. I want to apologize to every one of them for what I did… But I can't deny that I deserve this."

"Just hold on," Sarada said, shedding hot tears and holding his hands that were nothing more than a block of ice.

From the stalactites, pellucid water drops fell on his forehead. Yet, he felt nothing from his state of numbness. Naruto knew that his hour was almost up.

"We can go back to Konoha like you wanted, go back to our old lives," she said, pressing his hands on her flushed, tear-stained cheeks, as if that mere gesture alone would clamp his spirit down on earth longer. "So please, just hold on."

Konoha. In his mind, Naruto saw her lovely rose-colored hair fleet away with the howling gale, as if they were thousands of cherry blossom petals in the last days of spring.

"It's too late," Naruto spoke, distrait from his reality. With wistful glints in his eyes, he watched the last of her frantic rose locks evanesce from his view.

And when his cold, stiff hand hit the graveled earth, Sarada wept bitterly against his chest in the darkness.

* * *

A day later, Sarada found a small abandoned rowboat with a broken paddle nearby.

She dragged the boat to the shores, dropped Naruto's body in there, and pushed it out into the ocean.

As she approached the deep ends, Sarada hopped onto the boat, gradually paddling away from the cave, until it was distant, non-existent in her views.

It was a sunny afternoon, and not a cloud was in sight. The clear blue sky amalgamated with the clear blue waters of the ocean, making it impossible to distinguish heaven and earth.

Without a word, Sarada pushed his body out of the boat. He sank quietly like a rock, without protest, as if he was eternally asleep.

She leaned forward, watching him sink further and further down. Just before his body disappeared into the darkness, Sarada gently stroked the waves with her fingertips, and pressed her lips against the ocean, ocean that was akin to his eyes, wondering if Naruto was finally happy where he was.

* * *

 **A/N:** It's finally over. It ended in a depressing way, although this was foreseeable. I'm not even sure why I ended it like this, although this was my intention from the start. Interpret as you wish, dear reader. Thank you for reading!


End file.
